Anita Donderer

“First we came to one village, I remember that, it was terrible, they transported us in an old cargo train. They dumped us into the village dancing hall with nothing at all, no food, and obviously no milk or anything for the little one. Then my aunt, my mother’s second sister, went from house to house with my mother, wanting to beg for milk. Everyone turned them out. Of course: ‘You shouted Hitler, and now you have it, so no milk for you!’ Then they came to the middle of the village, where the big farms were. They didn’t even dare enter because they thought that the yard was so big that they would certainly not get anything there. That it was no doubt the home of wealthy farm-owners. And then... There was a lime tree growing in the middle, they stood there and burst into tears. But then a woman came out of that large farm, she was such a little, really very old farmer’s wife. She came and asked both of the young women – my mother was about 28, my aunt was a few years older – why they were crying. They replied that they had with them an infant without its mother, three months old, which was crying because it had no milk. After that, they were allowed to come to the farm every day to get some milk. That was, of course... and by chance, as chance would have it, when the families were being assigned to various homes, my grandparents were sent to that farm.”